


you will find me in places that we've never been

by dramaturgicallycorrect



Series: all my favorite conversations [3]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Hiking, M/M, Post-Zayn, mentions of the others - Freeform, walking in the wind au, zayn pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-13
Updated: 2015-12-13
Packaged: 2018-05-06 09:00:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5410844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dramaturgicallycorrect/pseuds/dramaturgicallycorrect
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>He wonders why it's Harry, out of all of them. It can't be that Harry misses him the most. Harry doesn't miss people. </i>
</p><p>  <i>It could be the obvious. Harry'd read some book about it early last year and spent hours retelling it to Zayn in such detail Zayn didn't even think he'd ever need to read it. Harry's said, "We should hike it," like that was something the two of them could actually do together. Like that was the kind of world they lived in together. </i><br/> </p><p> [Or Zayn quits the band and hikes the Pacific Crest Trail, but Harry's not invited.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	you will find me in places that we've never been

**Author's Note:**

  * For [carrotzuri](https://archiveofourown.org/users/carrotzuri/gifts).



> This is for [Cara](http://trashcat-tommo.tumblr.com), the Tommo to my Payno, whom I love dearly enough that I wrote a Zayn Payn Zarry for her when she asked me to "bring it".
> 
> So I mean a warning for Zayn pain because this takes all of the things that are lovely about Walking in the Wind and makes them ugly for a while.
> 
> This is part of a series of Christmas present fics (...loosely) based on songs from Made in the AM.

Zayn sifts through his pack like he's going to find anything new in it this morning, like he doesn't have an exact accounting of his supplies in the small notebook he keeps tucked in the front zipper next to his guide, like knowing the supplies he's got left isn't the difference living and dying out here.

He's not stupid. He's got a satellite phone that’ll work in even the worst conditions, he’s got a PLB, there are people that could come rescue him, he could find a trailhead and get a car to come collect him. But he doesn't want to be rescued, he wants to be alone. That's why he's hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. To be alone for the first time in nearly five years.

"It's a tough decision, between granola and granola, but I think maybe it's granola. Don't you agree?" Harry looks between the two packets of granola in his hand and then looks up at Zayn.

Zayn snatches the granola packet from Harry's left hand and opens it.

"Excellent choice," Harry says, tossing the other package over his shoulder.

Zayn eats and watches him grumpily. Harry isn't wrong, there really wasn’t much else in his pack to eat that’s no-cook, but it's also none of his business. None of this is any of his business.

Harry stretches back in the dirt in an outfit that's probably worth a couple thousand pounds, his hands folded behind his head so his shirt rides up to expose the laurels tattooed on his hips. He always manages to make the simplest actions look obscene.

He lays quietly, soaking up Zayn’s sun, invading Zayn’s space. Zayn doesn’t know how to tell him to leave, but he doesn’t think Harry would go if he asked him to.

Zayn doesn’t look at him, locks his eyes on his surroundings. This place is called Forester Pass. Nothing but a bunch of rocks, really, but it’s rocks he’s never seen before. It’s a place he’s never been before, an experience he’s never had before. He had become numb to traveling, going to dozens of countries all around the world and getting well acquainted with their hotel rooms.

This is what it’s meant to be like. The world’s meant to move slower, the things he does and sees are meant to settle. He’s meant to breathe.

He leans back, bracing his hands in the dirt and leaving the bag of granola resting in his lap. His eyes slowly drift shut so he doesn’t feel anything but the light breeze on his face as the weight of the world starts to ease its way off his chest. There’s always so much weight on his chest. He’s got plenty of time for the scenery when he’s walking.

“You’ve never told me your trail name.”

He deflates a little. Didn’t last long. He cracks a single eye open at Harry, and that’s all he’ll allow. “Don’t have one.”

Harry rolls over onto his stomach to eye Zayn, his phone suddenly in his hands. “We need to pick you one.”

He watches Harry read off some twenty examples before he calls it. “Zayn is fine.”

“You can’t pick your real name as a trail name. Not only is that a hideous cop out, it says right here, pick a gender neutral name for your own safety.” He taps at his phone.

“Pretty sure that’s just for girls.”

“ _Zayn_ ,” Harry warns in that way he gets that none of them ever have time for, but they probably should because it’s the kind of tone that keeps them from getting in trouble by saying stupid shit. “It’s for everyone. You can’t come out here and be Zayn Malik, you have to have a trail name.”

“I don’t want another name,” Zayn says sharply. He’s spent his whole life with his name mispronounced, misspelled. People make disgusting assumptions about him because of it. He’s heard thousands of people screaming it until it didn’t feel like it belonged to him anymore. It’s his name.

“Fine,” Harry says, clipped, rolling onto his back again to leave Zayn to his own devices.

He doesn’t know exactly what he wants out of this trip, but he knows what he needs. He has to reclaim himself, become his own person again. He has to figure out who he is and what he wants before he can share himself with the world again.

\--  
  
He wonders why it's Harry here, out of all of them. It can't be that Harry misses him the most. Harry doesn't miss people. Harry surely doesn't miss him now.

He imagines they haven’t changed their minds. It’s been a few months, but he’s sure nothing’s changed from the night he left. They were calling it a break until the legal shit had been taken care of, which Zayn had always found dishonest. He had no intention of coming back, and they knew it. They’d already drawn up the press release.

" _Normal_ ," Louis had sneered, tossing the paper down on the table, as though Zayn had been the one to write it. "Think you misspelled selfish, mate."

Liam had said Louis' name quietly and put a calming hand to his shoulder that Louis surprisingly didn't shrug off. Niall had refused to come into the room altogether, which had killed Zayn, cut him deeper than Louis’ words, that Niall had said his all of his goodbyes when Zayn told them he was leaving and he _didn't see the need to keep beating a dead horse_ on Zayn’s last night. Zayn wasn't sure if he was the dead horse or their friendship.

And Harry. Harry was there, sat on a sofa in the corner, pouring over whatever the fuck he’s always doing on his phone, looking like he hadn't a care in the world. Like Zayn wouldn’t be on a plane in eight hours.

"Maybe we should -- " Liam started but never finished because Louis stood up and snapped, "We don't fucking owe him anything," before sweeping out of the room.

Liam looked between Louis and Zayn, the choice appearing to tear him apart. Zayn wasn't going to tell Liam to go after him, not when he was always sure Liam would pick Louis, that Liam had been picking Louis for years.

Liam left and Zayn sat alone -- even though Harry was still technically in the room, it felt like there was already half the world between them. It was Zayn’s hotel room, so he wasn’t exactly about to leave, and he didn’t want to tell Harry to go. Not because it’s rude, but because he wouldn’t have minded it if Harry stayed and actually looked at him.

"What'll you do?" Harry had said eventually. He had looked bored, and if Zayn didn’t know better, he’d have said Harry was bored. More often than Zayn liked, Harry wore disinterest as armor against pain, difficulty, discomfort.

Zayn didn’t tell him about the hike itinerary that’s sat on his computer for some six months, because he didn’t figure Harry meant next month. He meant long term, for the rest of his life, now that every second of it is within his control now. Now that he’s not beholden to the Almighty Schedule decided on by everybody else in the world but himself.

"Dunno," Zayn admitted, but there was some level of exhilaration to it.

Harry’s face didn’t change, but his tone edged towards judgment. "Thought so."

Zayn doesn’t think Harry gets to do that, he doesn’t get to think anything of Zayn. There’s a reason Zayn called the band meeting _after_ his mind was already made up.

"I just wanted -- "

"Don't need an explanation, don't worry," Harry'd said, rising from his chair and finally pocketing his phone on his way to the door. "Especially if it's not going to change anything."

Then Zayn was alone.

There is the obvious reason he’s here. Harry had read some book about the Pacific Crest Trail early last year and spent hours retelling it to Zayn in such detail Zayn didn't even think he'd ever need to read it. Harry'd said, "We should hike it," like that was something the two of them could actually do together. Like that was the kind of world they lived in together.

It sat in Zayn’s mind until he started working at it, poking at a trip after concerts and interviews like a prize. Answer an interview question properly enough that their manager was smiling, spend an hour reading trail diaries. Make a fan laugh instead of cry, spend an hour planning a meal plan. Survive another plane flight, research waypoints in southern California. At that point the band started feeling more like a job than it did something he loved; it just took some time to realize he wasn’t in love with his life anymore.

When his plan was completely formulated, when it all matched up with the recommended guidelines for hiking the entire PCT, Zayn quit. He didn’t even know that’s what he was waiting for until it happened. He closed his itinerary in his laptop and went to tell them he had to leave. He didn’t have a choice.

Everyone in the world had speculated what he was planning to do next, where he wanted to go, how he was going to live his life. And they all knew better than Zayn did, they all knew exactly what was best for him. He’d prove them all wrong, doing the least Zayn thing in the world he could choose to do. And he wouldn’t even tell them what he was doing.

He’d spent about a month getting his shit together at home before he headed out, writing for permits, gathering supplies, making travel arrangements. He’d kissed his weeping mother goodbye -- she’d given her best argument for him to stay, that he’d been gone nearly five years and when he finally came home, it was only to leave her again. He had to leave anyway.

Zayn repeated in his mind over and over the bare essentials during the too long flight to southern California. Thru-hiking. 2,663 miles. About 20 miles per day. Northbound starting in mid-April. Five months.

That was the plan. The only one he had, the only one he trusted. Everything else would come later.

\--

Zayn blinks slowly awake just before sunrise. He's alone today, he can feel it before he even knows for sure.

There are days when Harry isn't there. Sometimes they're long days and Zayn feels every one of the twenty miles he walks in his tight chest and in his burning feet. Other days pass by like hours are seconds and miles are mere steps.

Either way he’s too focused on the journey, he’s too focused on not fucking up and getting hurt or worse, to spend much time thinking about what he came here to do.

He’s long past any struggles with the maps. He’s got a guidebook and on some days he can get Google Maps to work on his phone. He’s sorted the food out, learned to ration his water appropriately or desalinate if he needed to. His feet still bleed on the hardest days and nothing in the world can seem to stop him from tripping and scraping up his hands. But he’s okay. He’s doing okay.

There's nothing to say about the days he's alone because he's still figuring it all out. He could go back and be a normal 22-year-old. He could go to uni now that he's basically taken a five year long gap year.

But he’s not a fucking idiot. He knows what he likes, he knows what he’s grown accustomed to. He likes his comforts and his lifestyle. He loves music and wouldn’t let it go. Well. He wouldn’t let _his_ music go, if it was something that was born from him, if it carried a piece of his soul.

Not to say he didn’t put his soul into everything he’d done with the band -- he helped where they’d let him, but it never felt like his. It never felt like he stopped singing cover songs like they did on the X Factor. It was all you sing this, you go here, you say this, you don’t say this, you keep your head down, you do not fuck up.

It’s a lot for a person, to put them on a pedestal. To make them some sort of beacon of perfection, untouched by life, untouched by mistakes. When kids do dumb shit, it’s not supposed to be international news. His relationships -- the start, the middle, the end -- is nobody’s fucking business. The only thing that should be anybody’s business is what he gives them, not what they can take.

He doesn’t mind that people can see themselves in him -- he knows how important it is to be exactly who he is and proud of it. Asian, Pakistani, Muslim. The amount of support he’s gotten from kids like him, hearing their stories as he tried to normalize their lives as much as possible -- that always meant something, something deep and soul-stirring he couldn’t explain. That always makes it worth coming back.

If he is coming back.

If he did, he’d have to go it alone. It’d just be him up there with the microphone in his face. Liam wouldn’t be there to answer the tough questions. Nobody would only focus on Harry. Louis wouldn’t cause a ruckus. Niall wouldn’t be the light. He’s not part of a unit anymore, he doesn’t have his boys. He’s not sure what it means to do it on his own.

\--

It's stage Harry today, it seems. He loves stage Harry, has had some of the best times of his life with stage Harry, but the day-to-day whiplash was always hard to navigate. He’d wait every day to see which Harry he was getting: the one full of life, the one that reminded him of the earnest idiot he was back at the X Factor, the one who acted like a person; or off-stage Harry, who was quiet, measured, distracted, private even to his closest friends.

"Cast of the shackles of yesterday!" stage Harry sings, stomping along and pumping one of fists in the air. "Shoulder to shoulder into the fray!"

Zayn watches him blandly as he sets up his tent for the night, careful not to show too much amusement lest Harry go on for hours, thinking he's encouraged. Stage Harry is overwhelming, sometimes he’s just _too much_ , but there is little in the way of entertainment out here when Zayn gets bored of his own company. He only sees people when he goes into town to resupply, but he never stays longer than it takes to complete a transaction.

He thinks he's actually fine without people. People are a bonus. Harry's been a bonus, a shining light when he wants to be, when he remembers to try really hard. But when people are suffocating, Zayn remembers why he's fine without people. When too much is asked of him and too much is expected of him, he thinks he'd be better going at it all alone. Just going at life alone.

Maybe he _can_ do this alone.

"Harry," Zayn warns when he realizes it, but Harry keeps dancing away, flopping his arms like he hasn't a care in the world, all the while inching closer to the edge of the cliff. “Harry, _stop_!”

Zayn leaps forward and scrambles to get a hold on Harry’s black t-shirt, fisting the light material and yanking backward until he can wrap his hands securely around Harry just before he starts stumbling over the edge. He’s got Harry in his arms, clutches at him tightly, his fingers digging deep into Harry’s back. He almost lost Harry, he was seconds away, but he’s safe now.

He holds Harry until his own breathing calms, he holds Harry and remembers what it feels like press into his bony frame even if he can’t remember when the last time was he did it.

When Harry murmurs an apology, Zayn remembers himself and turns abruptly out of Harry’s arms.

"Fuck, Harry, what the fuck were you thinking!" he rages. This isn’t how he does anger, or hasn’t in a long time. But it’s not the first time Harry’s whole life flashed before his eyes and Zayn had to do something about it.

"I wasn't," Harry admits, his face crumpling when he realizes Zayn’s mad at him.

"Yeah, no shit,” Zayn says. “You could have thrown yourself off a fucking mountain. You have to be careful. If you had -- ” He breaks off and steps away from Harry, pressing his palms over his eyes because he doesn’t like the way they’re threatening to water.

“I’m sorry,” he can hear Harry say. “I’m sorry. Zayn.”

“Fucking leave it,” he says and hides in his tent, whether it’s done or not.

Zayn doesn’t come out until well after sunset, and he’s surprised to see Harry’s even still there waiting for him. He get as far as preparing and eating half his oatmeal before Harry’s standing over him with his hands on his hips.

"Let's dance, Zayn."

Zayn eyes him carefully. "You don't dance," he says. Flopping and prancing doesn’t count.

"I dance with you." He bows before Zayn, offering his hand like he’s bloody Prince Charming. There’s a reason people don’t often say no to Harry, and Zayn’s going to remember it at any moment now and he’s going to stop himself from setting the bowl down, taking Harry’s hand, and letting him haul him up.

Harry curls himself around Zayn again, going for a slow side to side shuffle that Zayn can handle pretty easily. It almost feels a little like Harry’s rocking him to sleep. This is Harry’s apology and Zayn knows he needs it.

"Are you mad at me?" Harry whispers, voice soft like he’s a kid.

"No,” Zayn says and rests his hands on Harry’s hips for lack of a better position. He doesn’t even know if that’s true.

He wonders if he even needs this, if he’s really been missing it. He’s never minded intimacy, but he wonders if he’s ever craved it. He almost asks Harry, _do I need you_ , but he doesn’t. He remembers when Harry used to be a necessity.

Harry’s hand trails up and down his back softly as he continues to sway Zayn to music he can’t hear. He’s hugged Harry before, but he’s not sure he’s held him, not for minutes, not in a way he’d hold someone before they took each other apart.

Once he has the thought, he can’t lose it. It has been months, even before he and Perrie called it quits because it wasn’t exactly like they were going to fuck each other goodbye, even after being separated on tour since January.

The boys played more than enough _if you were ever stranded on a deserted island, would you_ games to last a lifetime and Zayn answered _yeah I would_ every time because he was a kid and a kid can’t imagine a lifetime with just their hand to keep them company.

It’s like Harry can read his mind, or maybe Zayn’s just speaking his mind at this point, when he pulls away slightly and brings a hand to Zayn’s face. He’s watching Zayn like he’s asking permission and he seems to think Zayn gives it by not telling him no because he leans in slowly to kiss him.

Harry kisses as lazily as he talks, like he’s got all the time in the world and he expects Zayn to surrender his time to him. Zayn does and in bulk, giving as good as he gets, squeezing and pulling at Harry’s hips until there’s no more space between them.

"I've never kissed you," Zayn says, dazed, when they finally pull away to breathe.

"Missed opportunity," Harry answers, not a little smug.

"I don't know what you taste like."

He loses his grip on what’s real when Harry leans over to brush his lips against Zayn's ear, "Yeah but you've wondered."

He can taste Harry in his mouth, spearmint like the gum he’s always chewing, until it’s gone, startlingly fast like it was never there to begin with. He chases after Harry’s lips again to capture the taste once more, but Harry pulls away. He grabs Zayn by the hand and leads him into the tent.

Zayn goes down onto his sleeping bag easily and Harry settles over him like he belongs there, like he’s only ever belonged there.

 _This is fucking mental_ , Zayn thinks as Harry works his hand into the joggers Zayn wears to sleep when the weather isn’t too cold and starts to stroke him.

Harry’s magnetic and Harry gets what he wants, so Zayn gives it to him. Zayn lets Harry use him however he wants, goes pliant under Harry’s hands and lips trailing along his skin. He loses his sense of self, he loses his sense of self-preservation. Maybe his boys have always made him too weak to not just give them what they wanted, like he gave the whole world what it wanted from him.

"Is this real?" Zayn breathes as his eyes slide shut.

Harry kisses him, fierce and incredibly thorough, tasting as much of him as he can before he pulls away with an absurd smack. He skates his lips across Zayn's cheek to find his ear again. "No," he whispers and twists his hand in a way that has Zayn seeing stars.

When he finally manages to open his eyes again, Harry's gone. He's alone with his hand down his joggers and his breath heavy as it leaves his chest. He strips off his slowly stiff-drying joggers and wipes his hand on them, irritated he won't be able to wash them for another few days based on the route and how he can't afford to lose any of his drinking water.

Harry’s taken the last part of him where none of them had gone before, and Zayn gave it freely. There’s nothing left between him, there’s nothing more he can give.

He can’t even be mad at Harry, if it even is Harry, except it can’t be Harry because it’s fucking impossible.

If this is some sort of self-torture, he doesn’t deserve it. If this is some sort of lesson, he doesn’t understand it.

\--

Harry’s waiting for him outside the tent at dawn, sitting cross-legged on the ground. He looks up expectantly at Zayn as he exits the tent. Zayn can’t do it anymore. He can’t look at his face anymore. He can’t give him any more than he already has. If he’s gone completely mad, the last thing he’s going to do is encourage Harry.

“Go away,” Zayn says. “I’m not dealing with you today.”

Harry pouts, his lip jutting out. “That’s not very nice.”

Zayn shrugs and starts going through his pack to update his catalogue. He’s got a waypoint in two days, he’ll need to ration smart. He goes through the entire list twice and starts to pack his bag up when he checks in with Harry.

Harry’s looking at him with a sour expression and takes the quick flick of his eyes as an invitation. “Why are you here?”

“I'm hiking,” Zayn says, giving the obvious answer instead of the correct one.

“It could have waited, the trail isn't going anywhere.”

“No, it couldn't wait. I needed to go.”

“Why then? You had to go then, _right then_? You couldn’t wait for me?” Harry asks, and Zayn’s not even sure if he’s actually mad he did this without him. “You left in the middle of a tour. We weren’t done yet.”

Zayn pauses and looks over at him.

 _We weren't done yet_ , he says, but Zayn's not sure if he means the tour or the band. He hates that they have an expiration date, that they’re not meant to last. They’d all hoped they’d be doing it til they were eighty, but there’s always been too much of a pragmatic side to it, whether they liked it or not.

People are always keen to say their days are numbered, people are always quick to say how they’ve already exceeded everyone’s expectations. He knows they’re in limbo now that Zayn’s fucked up the plan, but he also knows they were never going to end on their own terms.

“We were never going to be _done_ , Harry,” Zayn says, abandoning his pack. “We were going to do the tour and then another album and then another tour and then another album, churning out shit as fast as we can until we’re no longer relevant. We’d have been left trying to salvage the pieces of whatever was left of our dignity, our lives.”

“Maybe,” Harry says. “So you'd rather not have anything at all?”

“Of course not, but you have to admit that’s a pretty fucked up future to look forward to.”

“We knew the risks when we signed on.”

“No, we fucking didn’t! We were seventeen and they said _do you want us to lay the whole world at your feet_? Who’s supposed to say no to that? Who’s supposed to think about any of the shit that comes with it?”

He feels like the dam inside him breaks, everything he's been holding for months, years maybe, rushing to spill over after being held back for so long. Leave Harry to chip away at the facade for weeks and weeks until he’s weakened him too much to stay together. He thought he’d given Harry everything last night, but he was wrong.

“It’s exhausting being told how to live your life. It’s exhausting never having a say. It’s exhausting doing things I don’t want to do and being told I can’t do the things I do want to do. What’s the point, then? Really, Harry, what’s the fucking point of living?”

Harry looks wholly unimpressed with him. Zayn knows it’s all a bit dramatic, but sitting quietly and taking it hasn’t done him any good so far. Not when that just allows people to think up the worst possible answers and then give them to you because you’re not providing any of your own.

“There's always going to be so much bigger than you, whether you like it or not,” Harry says, his voice growing lower but faster in the way it does when he’s defending himself. “There's always going to be somebody standing over you to tell you different. Thinking it’s going to be any other way is a mark of immaturity, selfishness.”

“You don't get to call me selfish. There's nothing selfish about looking out for your own safety and happiness,” Zayn says. “You’re insane if you think I haven’t done right by the fans I love or by management or by you four because I gave you everything. But I’m the only person looking out for me. It’s my name. My voice. My life.”

He lets his words ease off his chest and settle in the air between them. It’s a relief to articulate it for the first time, to put the words out in the universe so they don’t have to weigh on him any further.

“We said we were in it until the end.”

“Then I guess I lied. Is that what you want to hear? Fine. I lied. I lied to you all, I lied to the entire world, I lied to the fans, I lied to my family. I let everybody I love down,” Zayn says. “But I can’t live that life anymore, and I won’t tell you I’m sorry for it. I won't be a cog in a machine."

Harry’s quiet for a moment, staring at Zayn with a dark expression, before his voice goes soft and almost dangerous. "Is that all you think I am?"

“Harry -- ”

“Is that what Liam and Louis are, producing their own music, living their dream? Is that what Niall is, he’s just playing a part? The smile on his face is there because someone’s told him to?”

“Don’t bring them into this,” Zayn says because it’s a low fucking blow. He’s talking about himself, how he feels, not the rest of them. He has no control over how they feel and he shouldn’t.

“We’re a package deal, Zayn, you don’t get to pick and choose. If you’re just a cog in a machine, we all are. If you’re a robot performing music you don’t give a shit about, then I guess so must I. Never mind that my name is on it. I must be performing my own songs under duress.”

“How many of my songs are on _Four_ , Harry? And I don’t mean the ones we all did, I mean the songs I wrote. Which tracks are they?”

“We didn’t -- that wasn’t intentional,” Harry says, his brows furrowing.

“I know it wasn’t,” Zayn says, and he does. He really does. “But I shouldn’t have to fight for my own voice to be heard.”

He can imagine a world where he gets to make his own music in his own style. He gets to create with pieces of his soul. And that’s not to say that the four of them aren’t already doing that, if what Harry says is true. His heart isn’t in it and it’s an honest disservice to both them and himself to keep pretending.

“So you regret it?” Harry asks, his tone growing flippant again. “All of it? One big waste of time? Better off having slept in instead of auditioned?”

“Of course not. But I did it. I fell out of love with it. It’s over for me, so I’m moving on and leaving all of it behind.”

"All of it? Surely we could have been something to you.”

"You were,” Zayn says. Harry winces, so he amends. "You are."

"Aren’t we?" Harry says, acid lacing through his tone.

“Fuck you, Harry, if you really think that little of me,” Zayn growls right back. “Fuck you if you think the four of you weren’t the best thing that ever happened to me. But you four can't be everything to me, you can’t be the only thing holding me together. I can't live that way."

“You can -- ”

He holds up his hands. By some miracle, Harry takes the hint and the argument dies in his throat.  It wouldn’t have been fair to put that on them, to make them think they were responsible for Zayn’s happiness and they somehow let him down because he wasn’t happy anymore.

“I’m not doing this with you anymore,” Zayn says, his voice low and strained.

“Why not?”

“Because you’re not _real_ ,” Zayn shouts, his voice echoing around the field of rocks. He sinks down onto the ground because his knees aren’t going to hold him up any longer.

Harry laughs, an ugly thing, completely absent of mirth. “And if I were real, would you talk to me?”

“If you were real, you wouldn't even ask me to.”

Harry’s lips press together and whether he's a version of Harry or a figment of Zayn’s imagination, he knows exactly what Zayn’s talking about. Harry wears disinterest like armor, Harry’s on his phone, Harry’s in LA, Harry’s got one foot out the door. It’s an ugly thing to accuse him of, but that’s what the world thinks about him. So surely it must be true. Surely that means more than anything Harry could say to the contrary.

“We’re all broken now, in our own little ways, and we’re going to have to live with that,” Zayn says.  “I can’t pick up your pieces and glue them back together before they’re so smashed you can’t figure out what goes where. You have to do that for yourself. That’s what I’m doing and I have to do that for myself. And I can’t do that when you’re here. I can’t grieve when you’re still here.”

There’s really nothing left inside him, he’s given everything now. He’s just exhausted, down to the bone. He’s spent months pushing his body to the limit, and all this time pushing his heart to the limit. He’s got nothing left. He’ll have to rebuild himself from the ground up.

“You know everything now, Harry. You have all of me. Does it feel any better?”

“No,” Harry says.

“That’s why I didn’t tell you.”

Harry’s shaking his head, but he isn’t arguing anymore. Zayn’s spent months justifying his actions to himself, and that was only ever going to do him good. No amount of motive is going to change the fact that Harry still doesn’t like what he’s done. It’s not going to comfort him at night because Zayn’s not going to change his mind. It is what it is.

“I can’t tell you everything’s going to be all right,” Harry says eventually.

“I wouldn’t ask you to.”

Harry nods and he blinks and Harry’s gone.

\--

Harry doesn’t come back in the two days it takes him to hike to his next waypoint. Zayn still spends hours thinking about him, about their argument and what it means. About what the band means to him and what the future holds. About clean breaks instead of clutching onto the past. About not letting them hold him back and about not letting himself hold them back.

He wishes it wasn’t Harry. He wishes it might have been Liam, he thinks Liam understood.

It had to be Harry, he had to break Harry in order to let Harry break himself. He had to hear the worst of it before he was ready to deal with it. He had to figure out where he was coming from in order to figure out where he’s going.

He’s halfway around the world, anonymous for the first time in forever, doing something no one wants him to do or expects him to do. It’s freeing. It frees him up to search his soul to attempt to comprehend what’s in it.

Music is in it, he realizes, because it’ll always be part of him. The band too, that’ll always be part of him, that’ll always be how he got his start. But he can’t learn and grow if he feels stifled, he can’t become his own person if he feels pigeonholed. Even if nobody ever figures out who Zayn is, at least Zayn will have figured himself out. He’ll have a self-crafted identity, he’ll be the only person responsible for himself.

It sounds terrifying and it sounds liberating. He’ll keep creating as long as his heart’s in it. He’ll try his best to do right by himself and by the people who believe in him. That’s all he can try for.

He’s considering dropping out of the PCT altogether and starting right now. Just as he’s ordering more oatmeal than he wants to eat for the rest of his life at the general store of this quiet town.

“Are you Zayn Malik?” the clerk says.

Zayn freezes. He’d shaved his head before his trip, but his hair’s come back in enough to look a bit more noticeably Zayn Malik-like. He was hoping the rough beard did something to maintain a disguise.

“Yeah, that’s me,” he says, because it’s usually better not to lie.

“Thought so. My daughter’s a big fan.”

Zayn nods and pastes on a smile. He tries to think of some sort of subtle way to ask the guy not to out him. “Thanks, mate,” he decides on, which is safe enough for now.

“I thought this was a joke when it came a few weeks ago. Didn’t actually think you’d show up.” He shuffles away into a back room, coming back swiftly with a brown box for Zayn.

 _Please hold for PCT hiker,_ the box says, with an ETA of three weeks ago that his itinerary had guessed at quite generously. Zayn hadn’t really accounted for the three weeks he’d spent trying to get accustomed to hiking, barely managing seven miles a day for the first few days. He’d spent every step struggling to breathe for a while there, cursing how right his mum was about the smoking.

Only his family has a copy of his itinerary, but he told them he wouldn’t need any assistance on the road. He’d rather be responsible for his own way and not have them worry about him unnecessarily.

There’s a few picnic tables outside and Zayn hurries to one to tear the box open. It’s full of supplies -- dried fruits and good snacks for the way, lighter fluid that probably shouldn’t have been shipped in with the food, a six pack of clean pants, and the like. There’s a small sheet of paper tucked in under a can of beans and Zayn unfolds it.

 _All the love, H,_ it says.

Zayn’s tempted to crumple the sheet in his hands. Harry’s been waiting for him this whole time, giving him support he didn’t need or ask for. He could give the box to another hiker, an angel donation of sorts, but he can’t. Because the more he thinks about it, the more the package feels like a goodbye.

Harry leans against the table next to him, his arms and legs crossed comfortably, the very picture of relaxed.

"I'm not going to apologize," Zayn says.

"No need to," Harry says, which gives Zayn a good, derisive laugh. "I'm not real. So where do you think those arguments really came from?"

Zayn nods. It’s always been a struggle with himself, then, doubting what he’s done, justifying what he’s done, coming to terms with what he’s done, finding peace with what he’s done. He does have it, he truly believes that, even if it means Harry doesn’t.

“What are you going to do?”

"I think I'm gonna keep going on my own," Zayn says. 

"Yeah, I think you are." Harry ducks down to kiss his temple, and as soon as lips are gone, so's the rest of him.

He will keep going on his own, doing his own thing, living his own life, all the way up to Canada and beyond that.

\----

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! If you need me, I am [here.](http://wickershire.tumblr.com/post/135125756157/title-you-will-find-me-in-places-that-weve-never)


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